Commentary
Monday, May 1,1995 Page 5
College is life’s treasure chest
rree ai lasu free at last! inank
God Almighty, we are free at last!
I borrow that famous phrase from
the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
not because this is the last week of
school, or even because I am
graduating Saturday.
I’m not that bold.
I have this eerie feeling that any
moment now, I’m going to wake up,
find Bobby Ewing in my bathroom
taking a shower, and realize that I’m
really a junior chemical engineering
major who has just slept through a
final test. I will realize that I’ve
been dreaming this past year, and
that the graduation thing just isn’t
happening.
No, I borrow the phrase from Dr.
King because it has to do with one
of the most important things that
I’ve learned atJJNL. * t , • \
It’s not a fact that I’ve learned in
any science class, or a figure I’ve
learned in math. It has to do with**
living, and what I’ve learned can’t
be found in a textbook.
When I arrived in Lincoln, oh so
many years ago, I knew everything.
I was the smartest new freshman to
hit the campus. That’s what I
believed about myself.
I believed it so much that I
decided I really didn’t need to know
the facts about anything. I knew
everything basic in life, and I knew
what it took to succeed. Classes
became optional.
Why would I, a person that knew
everything, have to go to a class to
learn about U.S. history? It was just
a bunch of dates and names, wasn’t
it? Would I really need to know
them? And even if I did know them,
I would never use them, and I would
forget them as soon as the semester
ended anyway, right?
Todd Elwood
My problem for the first couple
of years in school was that I worked
harder to get out of going to class
than I did inside the classrooms. I
was even thinking about writing a
book on the fine art of skipping
school. “Life as a College Student:
An Imposter’s Guide” would be the
title.
But then, a funny thing happened.
I got terrible grades. Can you say
“academic probation”? I knew that
rywa couW. 1 '
I found myself in the position of
having to go to class, and this is
when I began to leam the lesson that
makes me think of Dr. King’s
words.
I still had the attitude that I didn’t
belong in the classroom and that a
college degree is just a piece of
paper that helps you get a job. But
then, as I began listening and taking
notes and reading books, I had a
revelation.
I realized that I was learning. It
was as if my professors were
handing me little pieces of knowl
edge. “Here Todd, take this knowl
edge, I offer it to you.” It’s amazing
to think of it in that way. We are
here for no other reason than to
leam. It is an opportunity that will
never happen again. I repeat that: It
will never happen again.
I realize that now. I know that I
will never be able to sit in a class
room and leam about U.S. history
for the pure sake of just learning it.
The aspect of not remembering
facts from a class a semester later is
still true. But the things that do stay
with you, that actually affect how
you look at the world, and that
literally affect the way you think, are
the real treasures in college. And I
wasted at least two years of finding
these treasures because I knew
everything already.
A professor of mine once told me
that we may leam very little in
college, but when we do leam
something, it becomes one of our
most valuable possessions.
When I heard him say this, I
made a smart-aleck remark to the
effect that, if we actually leam so
little, the university should charge
us tuition for just the things we
leam. Boy, did I know it all!
“You couldn’t afford it,” was his
response. He was right, oh, was he
right.
In a sort of twisted way, I would
like nothing better than to have
those first few years back. I missed
many opportunities to free my mind,
to take valuable knowledge with me,
and I regret that a great deal.
What I have learned in college is
that I know so preciously little about
this world. But I am miles ahead of
where I was coming in as a fresh
man. I won’t remember many dates
and facts, but I will take with me
countless treasures. They are the
treasures that I have found through
allowing myself to be free.
Free at last.
Elwood Is a senior English and
sociology major and a Dally Nebraskan
columnist
Writing stirs up war on values
About a month before her death,
my great-grandmother told me how
lucky she was to have lived such a
long and blessed life. She said she
felt privileged to have been a part of
America’s glory years, but she
feared a day was soon coming to the
country that she would rather not
see.
My great-grandmother blatantly
told me, “Jamie, I feel I am leaving
this world at a time when America’s
best days lay behind her.”
I did not want to believe that, as
much as it seemed to be true. It was
then I decided I wanted a return to
the days of the American high. At
the very least, I wanted to be a voice
of support for the ideas and ideals
that had made America a uniquely
great country.
When I came to our university
three years ago, I saw an all-out
assault on the small-town, tradi
tional values and family virtues that
I had believed everyone held sacred.
For the first time in my young life, I
witnessed the war between those
who would maintain the traditions
and values of their childhood, and
those who would not. It was here, at
college, that I came to understand
the concept of the culture war within
America.
Of course, now I realize college
is a time of expected rebellion and
limited decadence. But I also have
come to understand that college, in
many ways, is a time to grow up.
College is a time when we either
confirm or deny what we have
learned at school and home and
church'. It is a time when we either
admire and appreciate, or mock and
deride who we are and where we
come from.
My college days have taught me
that we traditionalists can never
retreat from the front lines of the
culture war; for that war is about
who we are. Nor can we simply yell
from the sidelines. Instead, we must
engage in the fight ourselves.
It is because of this knowledge
Jamie Karl
that I stepped up to this podium I
have come to cherish. And it is the
reason I will continue this vocation I
have come to love.
A loud, constant message needs to
be sent on behalf of the majority of
students: A message which makes it
clear that simply because we are on
our own for the first time in our lives,
we are not about to leave our values
and beliefs at home with the family.
For sending that message, I have
paid a price. The verbal attacks and
name-calling do take their toll.
However, my writing has taught
me that consensus in the debate over
our values and beliefs is an illusion.
Never will we have a general
agreement in America’s ideological
debate. Nor should we.
Instead, a majority ideology will
always prevail, making the minority
unhappy and angry. I have learned it
is impossible to have everyone
agree with you — or even like you.
And I’ve grown to accept that. Gone
forever are the days of go-along-to
get-along.
Our campus—and more
disturbingly, our country—has
become a house divided against
itself. But as I wrote early in the
school year, this war can only go on
for so long. There will be a winner
and a loser. Someone’s values must
prevail.
While the words and ideas of my
columns would have been taken for
granted half-a-century ago, they stir
controversy today, simply because
America has changed. Those who
say America has changed for the
better need to step back and look
around.
Throughout my life and the life
of my generation, America’s leaders
have sought to replace the enduring,
proven values of yesterday’s
America with new, “liberated” ones.
Yet the national epidemics of teen
pregnancy, abortion, child abuse,
drug abuse, wife abuse, divorce,
murder, suicide and the emergence
of gay rights prove that something
has gone fundamentally wrong with
America. These problems did not
exist three decades ago. And the few
other problems that were present
have yet to go away.
Despite the seemingly desperate
conditions, much of what we have
lost since America’s glory years can
still be retrieved. Most students at
this university have instilled within
them the ideas and ideals that made
America great when our grandpar
ents were in their prime. The great
days of hope for all Americans are
not gone forever. They are still
attainable, but it is up to our
generation to bring them back.
Over the past year, some said I
was taking my columns too seri
ously. But I believe the ideological
conflict we have had on the opinion
page is the debate that will shape
our future. If we traditionalists and
conservatives lose the battle of ideas
today, we ultimately forfeit our
tomorrow.
As we bring an end to this school
year, let it be known that everything
written in this column has come out
of a love for country, family and
faith. I have no regrets for the words
I have put on paper, nor do I offer
any apologies to those who feel
threatened by the ideas linked to
those words. I do thank those who
stood beside me and offered
support.
So until next fall, goodbye. And
thanks for listening.
Kart is a jaalor news-editorial major j
and a Daily Nebraskan colamaist and wire Li
editor.
Nature’s habitats
not private property
me proDiem is tnat tne spotted
owl has no respect for private
property. Birds are like that.
A toddler can be taught not to
step on a neighbor’s lawn. A
schoolchild can learn not to chase a
ball over the fence. Adults can
carve a rambling topography into
square subdivisions, and allot
ownership over mountains, valleys,
prairies.
But birds claim territory by an
entirely different set of rules. The
rules of nature. The rules of their
nature. And when those rules are
broken, they disappear.
So it is that two ideas, about
property and about the use and
ownership of nature, came into
conflict before the Supreme Court
on April 17.
The case pitted the timber
industry, the private owners of
millions of acres of forest, vs. the
government, the public protector of
the environment. The issue was
whether the 1973 Endangered
Species Act — itself an endangered
species of law — was meant to
protect only animals or their
habitats as well.
un tne tace oi it, tne debate
played out like the theater of the
absurd. The law had made it a
crime to “take” an endangered
species. The government regula
tions said that “taking” a creature
meant killing it, harassing it,
harming its ability to breed or find
food and1 shelter.
But the question before the
court was whether chopping down
a forest was the same as killing the
creatures that live there. Justice
Scalia seemed to believe that the
law was intended to penalize
people who harm animals by
hunting, not by logging.
The lawyers for the timber
industry argued that felling a forest
that houses an animal was not the
same as deliberately shooting down
the animal. You could destroy the
habitat without destroying the
species that live in it and off it.
They argued for a neat, legal
way to separate what nature had
put together. Though the beauty of
their legal argument might be lost
on an owl.
If the case of Babbitt vs. Sweet
Home Chapter is widely accepted
as a crucial one, it’s because this is
a moment when environmental
laws are at risk. The movement is
also at risk.
Today the adjective “environ
mental” comes with a ready-made
noun: “extremist.” As another
Earth Day came and went, many
Americans seemed to love the
environment and scorn the environ
mentalists.
Every business colors itself
green while “the greens” are
caricatured as government intrud
ers, bureaucratic busybodies. The
found it easy to attack the Endan
gered Species Act while portraying
Ellen Goodman
themselves as the protectors of the
little guys, not the agents of big
business.
But the case is also crucial
because it again brings up the
conflict between our desire to
protect the environment and our
belief that someone can do
whatever he wants with his own
property. It raises the question:
What does it mean for a person to
own 400-year-old trees, or a
mountain, or a forest?
In his book “Slide
Mountain,’’Theodore Steinberg
writes about “the folly of owning
nature.” He describes it in terms of
our desire to control the whole
world, to possess something as
fluid as water, as ephemeral as air,
as enduring as land.
He details legal battles over
water rights to underground
streams, air rights to buildings in
the city, property rights to the
moon. He talks of the dilemmas of
“living in a culture in which the
natural world has been everywhere,
relentlessly, transformed into
property.”
Indeed, in the 25 years of a full
scale environmental movement,
we’ve had difficulty moving from a
concept of ownership to one of
stewardship, from possession to
caretaking. Property rights are still,
in Steinberg’s word, our religion.
Human beings who live less
than a century claim land that has
been there since the dawn of time
as “ours.” We maintain the right to
“develop” this land, to behave as if
the only time frame that mattered
were our own lifespan.
It isn’t just big business that
wants to pave Paradise and put up
a parking lot. It’s also homeowners
who feel outraged if their back lot
is designated as a wetland when
they want to use it for a garage.
But in the end, we don’t own
nature any more than we own the
birds at the feeder. Or the owls in
the forest. Whatever fine points the
lawyers for the timber industry can
draw in a court, nature draws other
laws. We can’t save the owl and
cut down the forests any more than
we can destroy our own habitat and
survive.
As Henry David Thoreau wrote
in words fit for any Earth Day,
“Man is rich in proportion to the
number of things which he can
afford to let alone.”
© 1995 The Boston Globe Newspaper
Mike Luckovlch
