1989_09 The Daily Collegian September 1989

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Friday, September 22,1989
The Daily Collegian
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Poisonous tales
Steve Leone
Wants Jesus' character kept intact
Dear Editor,
Though I'm not sure. I believe It was
Mark Twain who said. "It Is better to
remain silent and be thought a fool
than to speak and remove all doubt."
The writer of the opinion column in
Thursday's paper has done the latter.
By attributing words to Jesus that He
never spoke, quoting scripture out of
context and Jumping to conclusions
about the Intent of Christians
protesting The Last Temptation of
Christ," he has removed all doubt
There were times when Jesus was
"gentle as a lamb." But when
confronting religious hypocrisy and
those who were leading others away
from God, He was hardly gentle. He
called them "vipers." "thieves-", and
"hypocrites" and He condemned them.
He overturned the moneychangers'
tables and ran them out of God's
temple. (A physical, public protest I
might add.)
He also did not affirm the "good" In
all people. Quite the contrary. The
Bible says that, other than Jesus.
there Is no one good: no one who seeks
God's will: not one. If Christians are
narrow-minded It's only because we
believe Jesus. He's the one who said He
was the only way to God. No one can
reach God on their own or through
any other religious leader, but only
through Christ (John 14:6)
Furthermore, the scripture you
quoted on Judging others (Matthew 7)
Is not a blanket statement against
being Judgmental- Jesus is talking to
hypocrites who condemn others -for
things they themselves do. He says,
Take care of the board in your own
eye. Then you will see clearly to
remove the speck in your brother's."
This latter statement shows that
there are times when we are qualified
to Judge others.
However. I must add that It Is not
our Intent to Judge others or force
them into believing as we do. We
recognize that that Is a decision each
one of us must make individually. But
if you were going to make a decision
this big. one that Involves the
spiritual realm and will affect your
eternal destiny, would you want the
accurate facts, or Just any old garbage
someone would feed you? That is our
concern.
Whether this movie is factual or
not isn't an issue. It clearly is not If I
were to make a movie about your
parents like this I'd be thrown in jail
and sued for libel. We want His
glorious character kept Intact. And
you should, too, If for no other reason
than to show respect for an historical
figure and to represent the facts
accurately.
Let's let people decide on their own,
but let's give them the facts so they
can make a rational, informed
decision.
Tracy Dykes
(Editor's note: the verse quoted in
Thursday's editorial was actually
Luke 0*97. King James Version, and Is
directly attributedtoJesus Christ)
More on racism, McCarthyism
Dear Editor,
This letter is in response to Lonnie
Nash's Sept 19 letter to the editor. I
find It hard to believe that Mr. Nash'
has any Idea of what free speech is.
In his letter he asks If Ivan Rowe
remembers back to the '50s and tbe
McCarthy era. He threatens that "one
more letter like the one you wrote"
and "you'll be teaching kindergarten
In     some     run-down     elementary
school"
Maybe Mr. Nash needs to go back to
kindergarten and learn that.people
have the right to speak out Letters to
the editor are for the purpose of
expressing one's views. Ever heard of
the First Amendment Mr. Nash? I
doubt it but, judging by your expressed
See LETTERS, page 3
Ttepecawt<runching crowd
shoveslntosee
Ttemuraixapmehandandfoot -
The big strip tease.
Gentlemen, ladies
These are my hands
my knees.
- horn Lady Lazarus,
Silvia Plath
I have awoken. People Is evil. Not
all people, but those who get into little
gmups and spout off about the
wasteland in the lives of others; those
who grow tighter bv fixa ting
maliciously on the little quirks ofthe
case bitch. loser.Jigurehead.
whomever— thosearetheevilones.
Gossip Is The Great Sickness in
America.
Admit It There Is an IrresJstable
temptation to overlook your own
problems and insecurities by "keeping
up to date" on others. This temptation
infects your system of curiosity and
pains taking need for detail until you
come up with some "hard facts," some
twisted conclusions about the
Involved subject Hence, the object of
your gossip becomes "revealed" for
you ail. Your group can rest easy,
then, knowing who the 'problem
people" are.
The "poor" souls Jimmy Bakker
and Ronald Reagan — brand-name
products ofThe Sickness in America
— have been revealed finally to us all.
In much the same manner. WeVe
wanted them to fall, and both are
types who get lost in the concept of
giving people what they want.
ina front-page shot of Reagan last
Friday, the former President gavanis a
chilling portrait of a man obviously
bralde^imself. With half a head of
hair altera surgical braln-fluld
draining, Ronald the clown prince
broke into a maniacal grin, revealing
with his picture the true madness of
the man- Robert DeNtro's Taxi Driver
character would have approved.
Nancy, behind Ron, was horrified.
Geez. we've had this guy run the
country for the past eight years?
Bakker's a sad case on his own.
After courtroom pressure. Jimmy
Bakker broke down completely and
hallucinated that the TV rameramen
were "animals out to get me...ants
wtth long antennas." Everyone was
out togetme. it wasn't my fault he
must think now. scratching out the
insldes of his eyes. From under a
table, hell say, Tftey wanted me to be
this way. Pulled down from his
pedestal, the whining Bakker is a
man of nothing, and we Ye made him
hke this with our commentary along
the way.
Alright then, there are. shall we
say, positive aspects of gossip from
time to time: Bakker. Reagan, etal.
Without Deep Throat's gossip, for
Wak Kelley's POGO
THE DAILY COLLEGIAN
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example, we would have never known
about Nixon's Watergate maneuver...
Indeed, some gossip makes good news,
defrocks the "right" people, etc. But in
small cluster groups, especially like
those around the campus, gossip runs
amok like looters after a full-scale
hurricane: tgot a vat of chocolate on
that guy; this crate of Captain Crunch
points to the true artificial natiaeof
that loser, and so on.
There Is a process to The Great
Sickness. It begins with an Incident a
quirk, or shred of a personal belief.
This Is related to others In full
monstrous form with hand motions,
dour expressions, spittle. and other
outward forms of exaggeration. Note:
these stories are relayed more
powerfully, and with more bias one
way or the other, when the storyteller
has an emotional attachment to the
incident, (When you get stories like
these. dis regard them from the
beginning— they're more than likely
filled with lies, or at least don t tel I
the whole truth.)
Within a department or focus gmu p
on campus, these stories run over like
thick dilapidated milk, until labels
are produced (created from story
analysis of course) and applied to t he
subject ofthe free-flowing gossip.
Enough said, the label will stick, and
each little incident following wj 1J be
analyzed with this label in mind.
Unless, of course, the subject soaks
herself in warm water for months on
end to help peel away layers of the
label. The best part here is that th is
validates a vacation In the south of
France for the subject Do it.
The gossip process doesn't always
stop here, though. Sometimes the
labels are created out of anger,
jealousy, etc., and many toa few of Ihr
focus group members may take their
gossip plans a little too far. At times
unaware of the true motives for their
ventures, these people with gossip
Information may take malicious
action to disrupt the subject's life or
workplace. These may take the forms
of: planted gossip— false information
given to certain "talky" people in the
group: telephone prank calls;
robberies; twisting stories to the
subject's friends to turn them against
them; and many others. I'm sure you
can think up a few of your own.
That is, quite frankly, when
gossiping becomes the most evil. It
talus a kit of negative energy to act
maliciously in this way, and more to
deny the truth ofthe gosslper's
actions. These are the types of evil
people who act as instigators and
audience members for the unnwdim;
of the subject Is it this that the
gossipers want? An unraveling? For
the subject to yell. "Hey! These are my
hands! My feet!"? No. It's Just the
thrill of not being the subject of gossip
themselves: an avenging for their own
history of labels.
Gossipers, I lay down my cheese for
you. As James Wright has written.
"[You] have wasted [your} life." The
End.
By Doyle & Sterneckey