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(04/26/07 4:00am)
If Wildermuth is going to be renamed, I would like to suggest it be named after George Taliaferro. Taliaferro Recreational Center has a nice ring, and what better way to honor one of the great contributors to not only IU athletics but all of IU and Bloomington.
(04/26/07 4:00am)
I can understand why those who are not involved with the drag culture may have misunderstandings and prejudices against it. Colin Dugdale clearly did not educate himself on the Miss Gay IU pageant or the drag community when he wrote his opinion column last Thursday.\nFirst, it is important to know that a transvestite is not the same thing as a drag queen. A transvestite is a heterosexual who enjoys dressing like the opposite sex, which from my experience is not how any former Miss Gay IU should be identified. Second, describing Miss Gay IU as nothing more than “hypersexed” is unfair. While it is true that there may be some sexual undertones in performances, as there are in many theatrical performances, this is not the message behind Miss Gay IU. Miss Gay IU serves as an end-of-the-year celebration of the GLBT community and its allies. It is the most widely attended event at IU for GLBT students and allies, and it opens their minds to a very positive outlook on the GLBT community. The performers at Miss Gay IU are intelligent, insightful and determined to make our community stronger.\nVicki St James, our MGIU emeritus, even fought for the show to go on in the mid-‘90s when several IU students and faculty threatened to shut it down. She, along with the other former Miss Gay IUs, are among the most active members of the GLBT community at IU, and their work should not be insulted. Finally, I am disappointed by Dugdale’s viewpoints on our contribution to Positive Link. We raised over $2,000 for Positive Link to purchase rapid HIV testing supplies, which he would have known if he actually attended the show. A couple of days ago a volunteer from Positive Link approached me and thanked me for OUT’s contributions, claiming that the business could not survive without us.\nI hope that Colin Dugdale conducts an extensive amount of research on the next topic he decides to voice an opinion on. If he does this, he won’t hurt the GLBT community again.
(04/26/07 4:00am)
Mr. Dugdale,\nIn an column published in the April 19 edition of the IDS, you showed concerns for the Miss Gay IU pageant. Your concern for the MGIU program, as I see it, can be broken down into three parts: professionalism on stage by those involved; the actual name “Miss Gay IU”; and your thoughts that a gay group giving money to HIV causes is hypocritical.\nThese are valid points, and hopefully I can address them all in under 350 words.\nThe OUT board set several new rules into place this year to help to solve the problem of professionalism on stage. By and large, it helped. However, we also have the problem of dealing with those that don’t want the program changed and we have to hear their concerns as well. The term “Miss Gay ...” is used all over the gay pageantry world, e.g., Miss Gay America, Miss Gay Indiana. This is used only to separate these pageants from their real-girl counterparts. There are also Mr. Gay contests as well, that will utilize “Mr. Gay (Indiana)” or what have you. The name is not meant to be emasculating toward anyone, but rather to signify that the pageant is indeed a female impersonation event rather than a real-girl beauty contest.\nPersonally, I do not feel that anyone donating their own money for any cause should be questioned. If you think your money is better spent helping the homeless or saving the whales, by all means, spend it there. It is very much each person’s prerogative to spend their money on the causes that suit them best.\nIn closing, I invite you, Mr. Dugdale, along with anyone who truly has issues with MGIU, to join me and the OUT president for a dinner meeting (on me!) where we will have open ears and minds to ways in which you feel that the program can be better run. We will consider each of these concerns as we go about planning for next year’s event. Please understand that we realize there are those who hate female impersonators and their shows and will never change their stance. To those people I say this: Your opinion is no less valid than anyone else’s. However, please let people form their own opinions before your thrust yours upon them. These programs set in place by us do a lot of good for the community in many ways, whether you agree with the methodology or not.
(04/25/07 4:00am)
Last Monday, April 16, the Commission on Multicultural Understanding awarded its annual awards to an undergraduate student, graduate student, faculty member, staff member, Bloomington community member and one campus program. These awards recognize and honor “individuals who actively support, participate in, or encourage the exploration of cultural diversity in and around the IU campus.” Additionally, the commission tries to recognize individual volunteers in their efforts rather than people whose job it is to provide services that emphasize diversity and inclusion.\nHerman B Wells was one of the first staff member recipients of the COMU award in 1986, and COMU has recognized many more outstanding recipients almost every year since then.\nWe applaud the COMU first of all for its outstanding work at Indiana University. For example, COMU has developed a brochure with valuable resources and advice for both undergraduate students and some international graduate AIs in order to help all parties successfully and respectfully overcome the communication barrier that sometimes occurs. This year, COMU hosted nationally renowned scholar and author James Loewen (“Lies My Teacher Told Me and Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism”) who hosted a series of workshops and discussions for the IU and Bloomington community about overcoming a powerful history of racism. COMU members are currently developing plans to respond effectively to groups that come to campus and advocate values that are not congruent with IU’s emphasis on diversity, respect and inclusion.\nCOMU also deserves our recognition for its continued efforts to recognize individuals who are committed strongly to promoting values of diversity in our campus and local communities and more importantly who promote respect and understanding of rich cultural diversity. So often those efforts go unnoticed; they are underappreciated and overlooked as we tend to reward personal success based on grades, scores, and individual achievement. The commission does its part to ensure that the people who give their time, resources and spirit for others are also duly rewarded.\nWe also ask: What would this campus be like if more individuals adopted such a giving, unselfish attitude? How welcoming would this campus be if more organizations and offices rewarded activities and individuals for the values that COMU embodies?\nA fully welcoming and inclusive campus cannot be achieved through the work of COMU and the handful of organizations and administrative offices with similar missions. Everyone on this campus has a role to play in order to “enhance the campus climate through education and increased communication on issues of oppression” and “promote greater communication on campus among all persons, regardless of race, age, religion, ability, gender, sexual orientation, or socio-economic status.” Those goals are part of COMU’s mission; but imagine if we all committed to those values.\nSo let’s all ask ourselves what we can do to make this campus and community the best it can be. It’s about time we all give COMU a little help.
(04/24/07 4:00am)
Did you know that, as it stands now, if you’re older than 16, Indiana law doesn’t require you to wear a seat belt if you’re riding in a car’s backseat, in an SUV or in a pickup truck?\nA bill requiring people in these situations to buckle up failed 65-34 on Wednesday to make it through the Indiana General Assembly’s House of Representatives.\nOpponents called it “government intrusion.” Some complained that, as the new version of the bill had removed an earlier amendment to classify trucks as passenger vehicles in funding decisions, it didn’t shift a large enough slice of the state road-maintenance budget to rural areas. The horror!\nIncredibly, the bill had already passed the House earlier (55 to 41). But the Senate removed the truck-classification amendment, prompting a new vote. Nice to know we have our priorities straight.\nSheesh. Have any of these people driven on State Road 37 to Indianapolis lately? Or, heck, just around Indy? Or Bloomington? Some days it seems amazing that there are any Hoosiers left – that some rush-hour misfortune doesn’t take us all out in some epic, “Blues Brothers”-esque pileup, leaving the state to be colonized by Kentuckians.\nAnd really, who hasn’t heard how seat belts improve survival rates of automobile crashes? In its 2003 Annual Assessment of Motor Vehicle Crashes, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reported that 56 percent of the victims killed weren’t wearing safety belts. In Indiana, the number was 46 percent. And according to the organization’s 2003 Traffic Safety Facts, 73 percent of restraint-wearing occupants involved in fatal crashes survived – compared with only 42 percent for those not wearing restraints. The NHTSA’s 2002 Economic Impact of Crashes study found that, from 1975 to 2000, safety belts saved 135,000 lives and $585 billion in medical and other costs. But if all occupants during that period had used safety belts, 315,000 lives and $913 billion would have been saved, the study found.\nYet here in Indiana, only 55.8 percent of pickup-truck occupants wore seat belts in 2004, a survey by the Center for the Advancement of Transportation Safety found. Thirty-seven percent of the fatal crashes in the NHTSA’s 2003 report involved light trucks – but, as the Indianapolis Star reported March 31, Indiana is one of only two states that does not require people in pickups to wear safety restraints. (The other is Georgia.)\nThe seat-belt bill is now going to a House-Senate conference committee to see if the two chambers can work out a compromise.\nC’mon, politicians. It’s time to quit dickering and get on the ball – there are lives at stake.\nIt’s not like this problem doesn’t affect legislators. On April 12, New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine was critically injured when his SUV was involved in a high-speed crash. He was riding – you guessed it – without a seat belt.
(04/24/07 4:00am)
NEW CASTLE, Ind. – Two staff members were injured in a disturbance among prisoners Tuesday at the New Castle Correctional Facility, a prison spokeswoman said.\nPictures taken from television helicopters showed at least two fires burning in the courtyard.\nNew Castle Mayor Tom Nipp told WISH-TV that he was told it was a “full scale riot” at the medium-security prison.\nIndiana Department of Correction spokeswoman Java Ahmed said more than one cell house was involved in the disturbance. She did not release the extent of the staffers’ injuries. \nThe DOC mobilized emergency squads, county police and Indiana State Police to the prison about 45 miles east of Indianapolis, she said. Nipp said the entire city police force had been activated. Helicopter pictures also showed police in riot gear standing outside the prison fence.\nIn March, Arizona and Indiana reached an agreement on housing up to 1,260 Arizona inmates at the prison about 45 miles east of Indianapolis. Bill Lamoreaux, spokesman for the Arizona Department of Corrections, said New Castle is currently housing 630 Arizona inmates, who began arriving in the last two months.\nAhmed said Indiana and Arizona inmates were involved in the disturbance.\nThe prison was established in 2002 and housed an average daily population of 450 in 2005, according to the DOC web site. It has a 2,416-bed capacity. It also houses a psychiatric facility that treats DOC inmates who are bused in from other prisons.\nGEO Group last year contracted with the Indiana Department of Correction to assume management of the prison for an initial term of four years with three two-year extensions.
(04/20/07 4:00am)
As the year comes to an end, the stress of final exams, finding summer employment or ending an ill-fated relationship can easily push a student over the edge. Sometimes a night on the town with friends, or 57 straight hours of sleep is all you really need to work through the life’s trials and tribulations.\nOther times, however, students just reach a breaking point. Though most of us on the editorial board relieve stress through a combination of tantric yoga exercises and aromatherapy, other IU students let the pressure build until one day, when their blood alcohol content reaches critical mass, and they just sort of snap.\nTake last Friday’s incident at the Glenn A. Black Laboratory of Archeology. According to Indiana Daily Student reports, a Spiderman-inspired student was arrested after the IU Police Department was called to investigate objects being thrown off the balcony of a North Fess Street apartment building. When officers knocked on the apartment door, he attempted to climb out the back window, only to be spotted by a second cop. After a brief altercation with the officer, the student was booked at the Monroe County Jail. \nIn addition, the student and two friends (possibly accomplices) were cited for underage consumption but were returned to their dorms following the incident. \nWhether alcohol was involved in the December 16, 2004 sky diving attempt by David Feldsott’s pet guinea pig, Noel, is still unclear. Sometimes what seems like a good idea at the time, is just inexplicably stupid. The then-freshman and Briscoe-Shoemaker resident fashioned a makeshift parachute out of duct tape, floss and a garbage bag. Though calculating the terminal velocity of a guinea pig is of monumental importance to scientific research, and a vital variable in the construction of an air-powered rodent cannon, animal rights groups were less than amused.\nIUPD managed to free the animal from the tree in which it crash-landed in. Feldsott was served with a $500 animal cruelty ticket after police investigators saw that his was the only window without a screen within the flight range of a parachuting guinea pig.\nIt seems that the moral of this story is not to throw things out of your own window, but encouraging readers to throw garbage out of a stranger’s window isn’t really the point. As much fun as it is to place bets on whose guinea pig will hit the ground first, we want to remind students that warm weather, cold brews and a looming finite math exam are ingredients for disaster. \nThis weekend, students from every school in a five-state area will be descending on Bloomington like inebriated locusts, most of them have been hammered since Tuesday. Suffice it to say, you’re going to hear a lot of really bad ideas this weekend: peeing off bridges, throwing couches out windows, flipping squad cars; the list goes on. Through the alcoholic fog, it will be easy to get on board, but remember, the police haven’t been drinking. They’re not going to understand that the vomiting from the rooftop gives the city color.
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Anyone else notice the 53rd running of the Little 500 bicycle race is Saturday? Judging by the widespread drunken debauchery we’ve noticed, combined with the thousands of stories in yesterday’s issue of the IDS, we’re guessing the secret is out.\nWe admittedly approached this year’s commentary at an immediate loss for statements to add to public discourse about the event. Most of the aspects of the race are covered extensively in our sports and campus sections. So what could we say that would be new and interesting? \nThen we realized that Purdue University’s Grand Prix will also be held Saturday. \nSince we jump at any opportunity to explain why IU is the best school in this state (most likely the nation), we came up with a few good reasons why our race week could beat up their race week in fight, even with one hand tied behind its back tire and its rider blindfolded.\nFirst, let’s get one thing straight. Little 500 is three years older than Grand Prix (in its 50th running this year). We’re not sure what they teach up there in north country, but we know down here that looking up to your elders is a matter of respect, and we would appreciate any groveling Purdue might feel compelled to give us. Was Grand Prix a reactionary creation to IU’s big race? Maybe, but that’s how rumors get started (rumor starts).\nThen, of course, there is police activity. Last year’s Little 500 week resulted in 37 arrests. A relatively low number considering the guesstimates in regards to the amount of alcohol consumed (remember the classic Little 5 slogan: Our school drinks more in one week than your school drinks in a whole year!). The 2006 Grand Prix week resulted in 141 arrests, a number that has been climbing consistently since 2003. The trend? It seems Bloomington police know how to let kids have fun as long as they stay safe. In contrast, the straight-laced conservatives in West Lafayette are out to ruin a good time. Cheers to Bloomington police!\nFinally, consider that until last year, both the IU Health Center and local Planned Parenthood showed increases in the prescriptions for emergency contraceptives during Little 500 week. IUB has about 1,000 more women on its campus than men. Purdue has about 6,000 more men than women. During the race weeks, IU brings back free love. Purdue brings back go-kart racing. I think we can pretty safely declare that “no contest.”\nSo as we indulge ourselves in Little 500 week, we take comfort knowing our tradition of drunken vice and public urination is far superior to that of the black and gold (though at least Purdue has a mascot; we want one).\nJoking aside, enjoy Little 500, be safe and remember that no matter what the little green fairy tells you, slipp-n-sliding down that embankment isn’t the best idea. Beer’s in the fridge.
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Editor’s Note: The following letter excedes the word length normally accepted in letters to the editor. Given the pressing nature of the issue and campus response, the decision was made to run the letter in full.
(04/19/07 4:00am)
IMU student fee will be used wisely
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Mormon-themed column lacks knowledge
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Comments about Christianity absurd
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Students should not attend Three 6 Mafia concert
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Sierra Club teaches good ways to help environment
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Partial-birth \nabortions inches from infanticide
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Hip-hop group demeans women, incites violence
(04/19/07 4:00am)
Start renaming with Kinsey
(04/18/07 4:00am)
Just when you thought it was safe to start enjoying music, the Recording Industry Association of America strikes again.\nLast week, the RIAA sent out 413 pre-litigation letters to universities across the country, 28 of which were addressed to IU. According to University policy, a user in question will be sent an e-mail notifying him or her of the copyright complaint, be required to complete a tutorial about copyright infringement and have 24 hours to delete all copyrighted material from his or her computer.\nWe say this latest crackdown is malarkey!\nThe music industry seems to be deluding itself into thinking this latest temper tantrum is actually going to make a difference.\nAccording to the RIAA’s Web site “…this new enforcement initiative has invigorated a meaningful conversation on college campuses about music theft, its consequences and the numerous ways to enjoy legal music.” \nOh yeah. That is exactly what is going to happen. There is no possibility this could generate further anger at music companies and make people even less likely to buy their products.\nSarcasm aside, we are not sure if music executives sit in their offices with fingers in their ears or if they never talk to college-age people, but for some reason they have not gotten the message that the genie is out of the bottle on music downloading and cannot be put back in. Aggressive enforcement measures have not now nor will they ever be able to stop people from downloading.\nIf one needs an example of this, just look at what is happening to the movie industry. The Motion Picture Association of America goes after downloaders much in the same way the RIAA does, according to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal. However, despite its best efforts, the downloading continues to flourish. For every site it shuts down, at least two to three take its place. \nThe real culprit here is the music industry’s anger at decreasing sales. We bet that if they started offering quality music at reasonable prices people would not feel the need to download as much.\nSo what happens now?\nThe RIAA’s executives will thump their chests, whine about their multimillion-dollar clients losing money, and look to put some college students in prison.\nWhile our attorneys will not let us advocate illegal activities, we do urge the RIAA to consider the consequences of what it is doing.\nBy offending large numbers of people and potentially prosecuting or pursuing litigation against them, the RIAA makes itself out to be the bad guy. Plus, is putting customers in jail or the poorhouse really a good business strategy?\nThe fact is the RIAA would be better off working with the downloading industry rather than against it. The online music market is a great way for artists to make a name for themselves and potentially inspire people to buy CDs.\nAt this juncture, the choice is clear: Work against downloaders and drive your business even further into the gutter or work with them and see a resurgence.
(04/18/07 4:00am)
BLACKSBURG, Va. – His classmates knew him only as “the question mark kid.”\nOn the first day of class last year, when everyone introduced himself, Cho Seung-Hui sat sullenly in the back of the room and refused to speak. On the sign-in sheet, he had put only a question mark for his name.\nEveryone knew Cho’s name Tuesday after he was identified as the gunman in the worst shooting rampage in modern U.S. history, but his reason remained a question mark.\n“He was a loner, and we’re having difficulty finding information about him,” school spokesman Larry Hincker said.\nWhat was emerging was a chilling portrait of a 23-year-old loner who alarmed his professors with twisted creative writing and left a rambling note in his dorm room raging against women and rich kids.\nEven when authorities identified him in connection with the shooting that killed 33 people, including Cho, some classmates in the close-knit English department didn’t know for sure who he was until they saw his photograph. News reports said he might have been taking medication for depression and that he was becoming increasingly violent and erratic.\nA student who attended Virginia Tech last fall provided obscenity- and violence-laced screenplays that he said Cho wrote as part of a playwriting class. One was about a fight between a stepson and his stepfather, and involved throwing of hammers and attacks with a chainsaw. \n “We always joked we were just waiting for him to do something, waiting to hear about something he did,” said another classmate, Stephanie Derry. “But when I got the call it was Cho who had done this, I started crying, bawling.”\nProfessor Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of the university’s English department, said Cho’s writing was so disturbing that he had been referred to the university’s counseling service.\n“Sometimes, in creative writing, people reveal things and you never know if it’s creative or if they’re describing things, if they’re imagining things or just how real it might be,” Rude said. “But we’re all alert to not ignore things like this.”\nCho, who came to the United States from South Korea in 1992 and was raised in suburban Washington, D.C., where his parents worked at a dry cleaners, left a note in his dorm room that was found after the bloodbath.\nA government official, who spoke of condition of anonymity because he had not been authorized to discuss details of the case, said the note had been described to him as “anti-woman, anti-rich kid.”\nMonday’s rampage consisted of two attacks, more than two hours apart – first at a dormitory, where two people were killed, then inside a classroom building, where 31 people, including Cho, died. Two handguns – a 9 mm and a .22-caliber – were found in the classroom building.\nThe Washington Post quoted law enforcement sources as saying Cho died with the words “Ismail Ax” in red ink on one of his arms, but they were not sure what that meant.\nAccording to court papers, police found a “bomb threat” note – directed at engineering school buildings – near the victims in the classroom building. In the past three weeks, Virginia Tech was hit with two other bomb threats, but investigators have not connected those earlier threats to Cho.\nCho graduated from Westfield High School in Chantilly, Va., in 2003. His family lived in an off-white, two-story townhouse in Centreville, Va.\nAt least one of those killed in the rampage, Reema Samaha, graduated from Westfield High in 2006. But there was no immediate word from authorities on whether Cho knew the young woman and singled her out.\nOne law enforcement official said Cho’s backpack contained a receipt for a March purchase of a Glock 9 mm pistol. Cho held a green card, meaning he was a legal, permanent resident. That meant he was eligible to buy a handgun unless he had been convicted of a felony.\nRoanoke Firearms owner John Markell said his shop sold the Glock and a box of practice ammo to Cho 36 days ago for $571.\n“He was a nice, clean-cut college kid. We won’t sell a gun if we have any idea at all that a purchase is suspicious,” Markell said.\nInvestigators stopped short of saying Cho carried out both attacks, although state police ballistics tests showed one gun was used in both. Two law enforcement officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because the information had not been announced, also said Cho’s fingerprints were on both guns, whose serial numbers had been filed off.
(04/17/07 4:00am)
Last week, 9th District Rep. Baron Hill visited campus to address School of Public and Environmental Affairs students on the Iraq war. \nHe defended the standard Democratic stance that the soldiers are doing a fine job but that policymakers have bungled everything. He asserted his regret on initially supporting the Iraq war, claiming the compelling evidence presented by the Bush administration were lies. For good measure, he addressed poor policy decisions on the matter of tax breaks for the wealthy.\nIt could be seen that Hill’s taking time out of his busy schedule to talk to budding policymakers is an example of his dedication to higher education, but we’re not particularly convinced.\nBloomington has classically been a liberal hub in conservative southern Indiana. And the environment of academia here has been known to breed a more a liberal point of view. IUB is a safe location to make a popular appearance and preach to the choir while looking like a supporter of higher education. It was an easy, safe decision to come to a liberal campus and use tired rhetoric to bash conservative policy, then be able to point to it and say, “Look how I took my time out for students.”\nConsidering all these factors, we’re not convinced that last week’s visit was not an easy, if wise, public-relations move.\nHill said nothing new, nor did he spark controversy. He did nothing to directly support us, but he definitely made himself look really good by appearing before us. Was his motivation for coming here really to support higher education and to provide an educational experience for students here? That’s for you, his constituency, to decide.\nBut to prove to us that this appearance was more than just a well-placed public-relations move and that Hill was not simply using us as a conduit to garner more support, Hill’s camp would be wise in planning such events in tandem with a more active role in serving Indiana’s educational interests in Congress.\nWe appreciate Rep. Hill making an appearance on our campus. Such programs are always a great educational experience and an understandable public-relations move.\nHowever, this cannot be used by the Hill camp as a distraction from truly supporting higher education, as the Democratic Party now controlling Congress claims to do. For Hill to fulfill his campaign promises of being dedicated to the educational interests of his district, he must continue lobbying in our favor, supporting bills that divert more funds to higher education and vocally committing to our causes.\nWe, the voters of this district, many of whom are students, put him in office again last year, and he must not forget his responsibility in lobbying for our interests. We should not be simply used as convenient pawns for the public-relations department. We should be served with as much fervor as the other sectors of his constituency. We like having his voice on campus, but where we truly need his voice is in Congress.