October 1 , 1998

Hey, you! Shut up!

To the Editor:

Two fellow alumni and I drove up from Charlotte on Saturday to see the Mountaineers play host to The Citadel. We really enjoyed spending the day in Boone and attending the football game.
However, we left the game feeling a bit frustrated.  This was due to the band leader’s behavior on the microphone during the game.  He talked throughout the entire game, barking orders at the band and even having personal conversations and making jokes that not everyone thought was funny.  During my four years at ASU, I attended every single home game, and as I recall, the band did an excellent job without having a guy “coach” them over a loudspeaker.  This guy (dressed in a black sport jacket) was loud, self-indulgent and a major distraction.

Everyone sitting around us was grumbling about his behavior on the microphone. The band is meant to compliment and add to the game, not take away from it.  Our band does a great job and adds a lot to the game, and they don’t need a guy yelling over a microphone to do it.

Jeff Davis
Class of ’93
Charlotte, NC
 

Sports nut

To the Editor:

I would like to point out a few observations to the sports editor regarding Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire. There are many reason fans are behind McGwire more so than Sosa. McGwire has been doing this for years.
He’s had three consecutive years of 50+ home runs, and 49 in his rookie year.  It’s not just dumb luck. He even leads the league with 159 walks, 86 more than Sosa. (By the way, McGwire’s average is .291 and not .250, compared to Sosa’s .305 — a big difference than what you stated) Sosa, on the other hand, has never hit more than 40 (except this year).
Remember Brady Anderson? He hit 50+ homers a couple years back, but look at him now. He has 17 homers this year. He was a fluke, and, more than likely, so is Sosa. Another reason is home run distance. Would you rather see McGwire hit the ball 500+ feet out of the ballpark, or Sosa hit one that sails 350+ feet and barely clears the wall? McGwire, because it’s more impressive. If you don’t believe it, look at Tiger Woods.
Nobody wants to see the golfer Payne Stewart drive the ball 260 yards, but everyone will pay to see Tiger hit it 330+ yards. It’s more fun to watch. Don’t get me wrong, I like Sosa and it’s remarkable that he’s hit 65 (as of today).
However, the reason everyone isn’t on his bandwagon is not because he is not white.

David Hoyt
dh28427@conrad.appstate.edu
 

The dangers of biking

To the Editor:

In your last issue, pedestrian safety on Rivers Street was highlighted. I urge you to advance the discussion by considering the safety of bicycle riders. Take this dare: With a bike and helmet, try to get from, say, Walker Hall to Hardee’s. You can do it, but it’s pretty terrifying.

There is a bike lane at Walker, but it is often blocked by parked cars.

Additionally, there are the jaywalkers mentioned in your article. They like to poise themselves for their illegal dash by occupying the bike lane. All along the path are drainage grates—which pose no problem by day but cannot be seen well at night.

You then approach the new stretch of road beside the construction site for the Convocation Center. Guess what? THE BIKE LANE DISAPPEARS. You now merge with heavy traffic and turn right onto the Blowing Rock Road. NO BIKE LANE HERE EITHER. Now you are in some of the heaviest traffic in the Southeast. You can now reach Hardee’s, but your appetite is gone.

I’m sure you share my view that pedestrians and cyclists are the great heroes of this town. They keep the air pure, decrease automobile traffic, provide parking spaces for others, contribute to the image of health we seek to promote and provide business for as benign an industry as one can find: the bike shops.

I therefore urge you to CRUSADE for better conditions for bike riders on Rivers Street and the campus in general.

Leslie E. (Bud) Gerber
Associate Professor, Interdisciplinary Studies
gerberle@appstate.edu
 

Stop whining

To the Editor:

I am writing in response to an article which appeared on your Sept. 24 Opinion page entitled, “Mass media devalues our lives,” by Aaron Pollack.  I am deeply concerned, if not greatly outraged, at many of the poorly founded remarks made by Mr. Pollack.

My first concern comes from the first sentence of the article. In his own words, Mr. Pollack states that he usually does not read newspapers because they sadden him with reports of bad news that foster public attention.

Pardon me for asking, Mr. Pollack, but are you naive enough to believe that people will be interested in reading about mostly good things?  The media is a way to keep the masses informed of the world around them, and thereby solicit the means to make an educated decision about certain issues that might affect their lives, and to take the proper measures to rectify those items of concern.
Perhaps a better question would be, What made you think that you were capable of making a logical statement about the state of world affairs if you keep yourself ignorant to the evolution of events which brought those issues to the surface? If the dealings of society are too much for you to bear, then perhaps you should separate yourself from them.

Secondly, and perhaps more personal than my first concern, are your snide and completely unfounded remarks about the moral integrity of this nation’s men and women who serve both you and I in our armed forces and police departments.  Being a veteran of the Marine Corps and an open-minded college student, I do believe that I can speak rather intelligently on this matter.

I can assure you, sir, that there is absolutely nothing glorious about killing another human being, nor is there anything so repulsive as witnessing the results of innocent people mass murdered by
other human beings who do not share, nor care to share, your sentiments of a utopian society.  You speak of the inhumane response that this world has towards those who violate the rights to “life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”  However, I did not read a single sentence of yours that provided any redefinition or alternate method to the way in which we should resolve these matters and
prevent them from occurring again.

If all you have to offer us are rambling complaints without solutions, then perhaps you would do better at making a public statement on the Jerry Springer Show...like I’ve always been told, “lead,
follow, or get the hell out of the way!”  I would be most curious to know of your personal dealings with the horrors halfway around the world and around our neighborhoods which occur each day
for some people.  Have you visited a third-world country, a war zone, or even the slums of any nearby city lately?  If so, did you want to stay there? How quick we are to opinionate ourselves when
we are not a part of the equation

It sickens me to think of how quickly my generation forgets the sacrifices made by others so that they can simply read opinions like yours in a college newspaper. And you, sir, are a prime example of such uninformed forgetfulness.  Educate and liberate yourself, Mr. Pollack.

Jon Chisholm
ASU Box 06525
 

Walk, you lazy bums

To the Editor:

As I walk around campus and listen to the loud voices of the university, there is one expression that stands out in my mind. That is, “Whaaaaaaaah, I have nowhere to park.”

Almost everybody on this campus is constantly whining about the problem with parking on campus, and quite frankly, I do not see a problem with parking.  The only problem I see is a problem with laziness.

I see only two kinds of people on campus: those who are in shape and those who need to get in shape.  This means that everybody on campus can either walk or run anywhere they need to go in town, or they need to start walking or running anywhere they need to go in town.

I know some of you cringe at the thought of actually walking all the way out to Wal-Mart, but it can be done. If you do not believe me, watch the Boston Marathon. If a human can jog 26 miles, it should be no problem for even the laziest of students to walk a couple of miles to Wal-Mart.  If need be, you could even hike to Blowing Rock.

I’m not here to say that I am a super, in-shape person, because I am far from it.  I do also have a car, and I will get in my car and drive to the market before I will walk there.

I also do not get to park on campus during classes, as it is forbidden to most students. But when I think about some of my friends who have no car, and about people in underdeveloped countries who  don’t even have roads to drive cars on, I kind of feel that this campus is getting all shook up about spilled milk.

I have heard seniors complain that they have to park at South lot, while seniors in the past got to park at the stadium lot.

So what? You get to ride the Appal Cart up there, so it isn’t like you have to spend any energy to get your car.

The people who operate this university are charged with educating you. The last time I looked in the registration handbook, I did not notice any classes being taught in any parking lots.

What the school should build, if anything, is more classroom buildings and more dorms for students.

In closing, I’d like to say just one more thing: Nothing on this campus is going to change through The Appalachian. The only way to get things done in America is to annoy people.

You have to get picket signs and march all around Boone and around the houses of the people of authority and keep them up all night listening to the wonderful sounds of the oppressed masses. But you would have to walk to do that, so that is out of the question.

Mark A. Seabolt
ASU Box 17842
 
 

Defending grammar

To the Editor:

This is my third year here at Appalachian State.  As a freshman, I decided that reading The Appalachian wasn’t worth my time.

Recently, I decided I would give the paper another chance.  This simply reminded me of why I haven’t read it in the past two years.

Reading the Sept. 22 issue was a complete waste of my time.  There were only 13 articles in a ten-page paper (and that’s counting articles about legalizing drugs, psycho girlfriends, and landlords that don’t care about students - all QUALITY articles), and only a few were relevant.

There was one article that particularly enraged me.  The article to which I am referring is Justin Griffin’s portion of “Is Baseball Still America’s Game?”  There are three major problems with this article: the article doesn’t talk about what the title says, the grammar is horrendous, and the statistics he gives are completely wrong.

I can’t say the entire article was bad.  The hook on the first page was very good.  When I read, “Baseball: Do we really need it?” I wanted to read the article.  But, on the whole, if I saw someone reading this article, I wouldn’t tell them that I go to Appalachian.

The subtitle, “No: The pace of baseball is too slow for today’s shortened attention span,” says that the article will be about the pace of baseball and the fact that Americans don’t want to watch a game that is that long.  Now Justin does talk about that for a while, but half the article is about other topics. Unless, of course, inter-league play and the home run race are examples of how baseball is slow-paced. The first question I have is why is “Baseball” capitalized? If this is capitalized, so should “still” and “game.”  The second of many mistakes comes in the opening paragraph. The entire article is poorly written, but I’ll focus just on this paragraph, being that it’s the most important part of the article.

The first paragraph of Justin’s masterpiece read as follows: “Question: What takes longer? A) Charlton Heston reading War and Peace B) a baseball game C) a reading of the rap sheet on the Fresno
State University basketball team.”  Now maybe he was trying to make it look like a test, but it should still have some sort of grammar.

First of all, “What” should not be capitalized (“Do” in the hook and “The” in the subtitle shouldn’t be either). I know after a colon you pause, but it’s not a period.  The second sentence-and I use the
word sentence loosely - is terrible.  One problem is that before a gerund, the noun should be possessive. The sentence should say, “...Charlton Heston’s reading ...” I know that’s a very obscure rule that no one really knows, but he is a senior who is getting paid to write for a paper.  He should have good grammar.  Another thing about this sentence is that the list isn’t set off by commas. If Justin
wants to see how to properly write a list using an introductory clause, he can look back in my letter (lines 10-11). You may also notice that in mine, “the” isn’t capitalized after the colon.  Now, maybe he was trying to be funny and make it seem like a test. If that is the case, he could have written it in that format instead of paragraph form.  A third thing is that the title of a book is neither in italics, nor underlined.  I know it’s a lot of work to underline the name of a book, but it should be done.

Oh, and one other small thing I noticed is that THERE’S NO VERB!  Now it is hard to remember that part, but it is important.  I have an eight-year-old cousin who knows that the two main parts of a sentence are the subject and the VERB. It’s nice to have a list of nouns, but it’s not a sentence.

If this article were written for any teacher, from the first paragraph alone, it would probably fail.  At ten points per grammar mistake, he would start at a 70 after two sentences.  And that’s not even taking into consideration that the entire article is poorly written and shows a complete lack of knowledge of baseball.

Now, maybe some of these mistakes aren’t his fault.

And the most terrible thing is that he has absolutely no clue about the statistics of Mark McGwire or Sammy Sosa.  To begin with, everyone that follows baseball knows that Sosa will definitely win the MVP before McGwire.  Secondly, Justin says, “Sosa’s batting average is better than .300, McGwire is at around .250...”

To begin with, that sentence is a run-on. Conjunctions and semi-colons are a writer’s friend.  And besides that, McGwire’s batting average is .294.  Now Sosa’s is .305, a little better, but saying that
McGwire’s is “around .250” is outrageous.  Unless Justin is rounding down to the nearest .05, he’s just making up statistics to try to accredit his ideas.  And while we’re talking about statistics, McGwire’s on-base percentage is .468 and his slugging percentage is .737.  Comparing these to Sosa’s on-base percentage of .373 and slugging percentage of .642, you can easily see that McGwire’s statistics are much better.  Maybe he got his information a couple days ago, but even on the 19th, McGwire’s average was .290 (.040 points above .250) and Sosa’s was .307.  This explains where his differences in information came from.

I’m still not sure where Justin got his information.  Maybe he just came in the computer lab and asked what McGwire’s average was. When someone said “around .250,” he took it as Bible truth.  Reading his writing, it’s not hard to be convinced that he would believe this person and write these statistics in his article.

Josh Briggs
ASU Box 16665