Opinion
Policing hate
Gay officers unpopular, but necessary
The police chief in San Jose, Calif., took what many
may call a radical step last week, announcing a
drive aimed at recruiting gay police officers.
Chief Lou Cobarruviaz said he hoped having more gay
police officers would encourage victims of anti-homosex
ual hate crimes to report the attacks. Now, gay men and
lesbians could be prevented from reporting the crimes
because they may be afraid to approach the police, he
said
The drive merely expands on a minority recruitment
program already in place in the San Jose Police Depart
ment. Cobarruviaz himself helped start the minority
recruitment project during the 1960s.
Too often, gay men and lesbians are ignored in pro
grams directed to help members of minority groups. But
when it comes to hate crimes, gay men and lesbians rarely
are ignored.
Sadly, “gay-bashing" is common in America. Worse
yet, it is accepted — and condoned — by tar too many
Americans.
Hate crimes against other minority groups receive a
great deal more publicity and outrage than attacks against
gay men and lesbians. But the pain caused by such attacks
cannot be ignored, even by the most closed-minded
people.
II it succeeds, the San Jose Police Department's policy
will help bring such crimes to light. And the path toward
ending such hate crimes will begin when more gay men
and lesbians are able to report the attacks.
Police should do all they can to make victims of crime
more comfortable. In some instances, that means provid
ing an obviously sympathetic ear.
Police departments without women officers to hear
victims' stories of rape or without African-American
officers to hear victims’ stories of racially motivated
crimes would be unthinkable. The same should be true for
hate crimes against gay men and lesbians.
San Jose was not the first to begin such recruitment
efforts. The San Francisco Police Department began
recruiting homosexuals in the 1970s.
Nevertheless, Chief Cobarruviaz’s “radical" move
probably will not be popular.
Until Americans realize that all hate crimes cause
needless pain, gay men and lesbians will have to rely on
themselves for defense.
Playboy ad ‘weakens the will’
I am writing in reaction to the
Playboy ad you published on page
three of the March 3 edition.
We arc not each in our own world
— our own cubicle untouched or af
fected by others. We may be as sepa
rate as those walking through a re
volving door. Yet, if someone docs
not push, or in any way impedes its
revolution, the others arc affected.
Perhaps they may not gel through.
Similarly, by publishing a sexu
ally explicit advertisement, you im
pcdcany or all aversion one may have
to viewing pornographic material. Yes,
we all may make a choice. We need to
make a good choice, and you arc not
helping. We have a God-given free
will to make choices. This is good in
and of itself. However, to view a full
page ad of pornography weakens the
will by posing to it natural, sexually
inclined barriers that impede itsorigi
nal decision — thus making u narucr
or perhaps impossible to choose
correctly. In fact, it may impede the
will so much that every lime it comes
in contact with such barriers it must
choose the inclination. Therefore,our
will is in fact not free anymore.
All of humanity is falling under
the weight of such sexual advertise
ment. Beer commercials, car com
mercials, jeans (1 won’t menuon Bugle
Boy), pop and even breakfast cereal
ads employ sex appeal in order to
weaken the wills of the buyer. So
please, print what is newsworthy, but
quit making it so hard to choose what
is right. Wrong is chosen easily enough
as it is.
Michael Lilly
senior
secondary math education
DN shouldn t bend to pressure
Inc Daily Nebraskan, in irom-page
stories Monday and Tuesday, referred
to a certain newsmaker as “UNL stu
dent Andrew Scott Baldwin.” Accu
rate? Absolutely.
But Baldwin wasn't the subject of
a 10-paragraph story on Monday and
a 19-paragraph story on Tuesday
because of his status as a garden
variety “UNL student.’ His story is
front-page fodder because — and only
because — he is or was a Nebraska
football player. Neither story refers
to Baldwin — charged w ith assault in
the beating of Gina Simanek — as a
Nebraska football player.
When pinning labels on people,
journalists should pick the one from
which the newsmaker derived his or
her notoriety. If Tom Osborne, for
t
instance, were tu muR.e news iui iva
sons not related to football, he still
should be referred to in news columns
as Nebraska’s football coach. He may
well be a red headed churchgoer who
can catch big fish and fly small planes
— but that's not why he’s in the
newspaper.
Not all DN stories have affixed to
Baldwin the over-inclusive nametag.
The hope here is that the DN is not
backing down and intentionally sac
rificing good journalism in order to
mollify those who berated the paper
for its complete and commendable
coverage of a sad incident.
Steve Thomas
second-year law student
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PAUL SOUDERS
Biological acts merit attention
Tucked away on the third or
fourth page of most American
newspapers last Tuesday sat
four paragraphs of hope. Hope that,
for once, a visible political body did
something sensible.
Only two of the nation’s nine su
preme court justices agreed to hear a
plea from the Bush administration
and private advocacy groups for re
viving a government ban on “inde
cent” media material. Four justices
were needed simply to resurrect the
ban and hear arguments on the case,
but Bush couldn’t even conjure up
that amount.
In a court that basically is the long
arm of the Rcagan/Bush law, this is
tantamount to mutiny. The court, in
essence, is saying “this idea is SO
stupid we won’t even waste our lime
on it.”
While I’m not going to hold my
breath waiting for this particularcourt
to uphold my civil liberties. I’ll sigh a
liny puff of relief. My constitutional
right to publicly talk about doodics
and wee-wees on broadcast media
has been protected.
The ban aimed to eradicate that
worst of social evils, “indecent”
material describing “sexual or excre
tory activities or organs,” ostensibly
for the purpose of protecting our chil
dren’s tender minds — children who
supposedly never spend time think
ing about sex or excretion.
Well, I can say with firm convic
tion that children at least have the
business of “excretory activities” down
pat; they’ve been practicing since birth.
All of this begs the question, “So
what?” What’s so tragically wrong
with sexual or excretory activities or
organs that some people don’t want
us to talk about them? I’ll wager that,
barring sleeping and eating, sex and
excretion arc the two things almost
everyone on Earth who has ever lived
can do well.
The fact that very few people die
of urine retention shows that we seem
to have mastered excretion, while the
sheer number of Homo sapiens get
ting in the way of everything else
demonstrates that humans are really
awfully good at sex.
But where this ban concept comes
from, I can’t even guess. I imagine
lots of long-haired psychologists have
all sorts of repression theories to explain
this characteristically American fussi
ncss,and historians will point to white
America's puritanical heritage.
i’ll wager that, bar
ring sleeping and
eating, sex and excre
tion are the two
things almost every
one on earth who
ever has lived cm da
well.
Well, I don’t much care where
American stuffiness came from; I just
wonder why we have it at all.
Every item on the list of words
unacceptable on prime-time network
television is related to cither sex or
excretion, although (as I’ve already
pointed out) these arc things we doall
the time anyway. And, let’s lace it,
they’re pleasant enough pastimes,
especially if one cals plenty of fiber
and has no compunctions about read
ing with one’s pants around one’s
ankles.
But even the most socially loose
American gets a little warm about the
ears when his or her small child an
nounces loudly in Perkins that “I gotta
go make dtxxly.”
Those ol us sitting a table away
snicker quietly and then politely pre
tend the whole thing never happened,
since nobody,even a small child, has
a need to excrete in so popular a place
as Perkins.
Frank discussions of gluttonous
eating habits are perfectly acceptable
— even encouraged —- in most res
taurants, but heaven forbid express
ing a necessity for cither a) a relaxing
excretory episode, or b) a fleeiingly
ecstatic sexual encounter.
I know already that this column
will be loathed by more than a few
readers, solely because of its content.
Never mind that I ma really nice guy.
Literature, I am told, "exists to
ennoble the human condition; to lift
humanity, through rationality, from
its pathetic quagmire of filth and
animalism.”
This is all nice and good but none
theless flies in the face of the fact that
we spend our enure lives pursuing
basically four goals: food, sleep, sex
and excretion.
These arc perfectly acceptable
activities that most people enjoy, so
why not pay a little lip service to
biological function? There’s nothing
terribly rational or noble about it, but
I’ll spend the rest of my life doing it,
and so will everyone else.
Except Abigail Van Buren.
“Abby” of “Dear Abby” fame is a
notoriously non-biological person,
which makes me wonder if she isn t
really some sort of android.
Virtually every Dear Abby sce
nario can be summed up as: X has
love problem with Y, with little hope
of reconciliation, and so X goes to
Abby for advice. Abby suggests X
deliver ultimatum to Y (alternate
solution; X rationally discusses the
problem with Y),and if Y fails to pass
muster, he or she was wrong for X
anyway.
What Abby (and she’s not alone)
seems to have forgotten is that there’s
nothing at all even remotely rational
about love. Love generates such cou
plings as same-sex, interracial, intcr
social-class and inter-generational
relationships, despite such rational
reasons as family scorn and social
disapproval for behaving otherwise.
Human beings arc always lading
in love with one another for appar
ently no good reason at all except lor.
often, some sort of sexual chemistry,
and I can’t exactly call that reason
able.
Plenty of you out there will chide
me and deride me for thinking about,
discussing and even (gasp) commit
ting blatantly biological acts of sex or
excretion or ingestion or sleep, al
though not generally all at the same
time.
To them I offer no apologies, be
cause. well gosh, I like it. 1 o my soul
siblings, the rest of the hedonists and
flesh-worshipers, I ask of you only
one thing: Give me a cad once in a
while, huh?
Souders is u junior Kn^lish major and a
Daily Nebraskan columnist.
