ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, October 13, 1996 TAG: 9610120004
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: 2 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: LETTERS
REGARDING drug-sniffing dogs in our school settings (Sept. 19 news article, ``Roanoke County schools may use drug-sniffing dogs''):
Why does there seem to be such a dilemma concerning whether to bring in drug-sniffing dogs to Roanoke schools? One of the first priorities of schools is to provide a safe environment for the students, teachers and staff. We can agree that the presence of drugs on our campuses lessens the safety of the environment.
We have to face hard facts. Drug use among teen-agers has increased drastically. Marijuana use among teen-agers is up 141 percent. There is a 161 percent increase in cocaine use. Clearly, these drugs have become very accessible to teen-agers.
The use of drug-sniffing dogs is an effective way to reduce and deter drug possession in the schools. People who do not see the need for them live with a false sense of security. If these individiuals feel there are no drugs, they have nothing to fear with the dogs coming on campuses. It just supports their opinion.
The use of drug dogs will not stop drug possession and distribution. However, it does send clear images. We will not tolerate this behavior, and we will deter drug possession in our schools. It shows that we are gaining control of our school setting. We have nothing to lose and everything to gain by bringing in the dogs. KEITH GOFF ROANOKE
A failure to put art in perspective
FOR THE more than 10 years that I've been reading The Roanoke Times, I've become increasingly disgusted with the many choices made by your editors. None has so frustrated me as much as your decision to use a story (Sept. 14, ``Composer: Don't like me, don't listen to my music'') about the complaints of an artist/teacher at Virginia Tech at the top of the front page above the headline "Clinton sends 5,000 troops to Kuwait.''
I am appalled for many reasons. Has the removal of "World-News" from your title removed your sense of priorities? When did the personal difficulties of a composer in Southwest Virginia take precedence over the real tragedy and triumph in the world that we artists are moved to interpret?
In addition, I cannot recall a single local artistic event or personality (save perhaps Victoria Bond) ever having made the front page of your newspaper. It strikes me as odd (and more than a bit biased) that the squabbles and demands of one Tech professor should be placed in such a prominent position when the positive work of area artists is regularly neglected in your coverage. It seems that you try to encourage the growing suspicion of artists in America today, and to further your recent attempts to discredit higher education in all fields.
Ironically, your newspaper did a superficial feature in the following issue entitled "What is art?" Given the dearth of in-depth theatrical, musical and visual-art coverage in your newspaper and your failure to employ articulate critics of the arts, it seems you still desperately need the answer to that question.
Let me assure you that in higher education there are brilliant musicians, actors, designers, dancers, singers, composers, painters and sculptors who valiantly produce and explore their own art forms, serve the community in which they live, and who excel at the education of their students. In my 10 years as an artist/teacher at Tech, I've found hard work, dedication and excellence in my colleagues to be the rule rather than the exception.
I challenge you to cover these devoted individuals and their creative works more fully, but never above the raw material from which all art springs - the joys, tumult and trials of the "world news.'' PATRICIA RAUN Associate Professor, Department of Theater Arts, Virginia Tech BLACKSBURG
Abortion protestors are there to pray
GLENN AYERS stated, among other things, in his Sept. 27 letter to the editor (``Jesus outside the abortion clinic'') that Jesus stepped up and said, ``Whoever among you is without sin, block the door.''
Well, I agree with that. If Ayers would come down to the abortion mill - or Planned Parenthood - when we are there, he will never see the door blocked. What he will see are quiet people praying for the children being killed, for their misguided mothers and for the medical personnel.
Even Jesus said to the woman, ``Go and sin no more.'' PAUL LAUKAITIS ROANOKE
Shave their heads, see if they stay
SOME WOMEN and politicians made a big deal about the Virginia Military Institute's admissions policy, and claimed that if women want the VMI experience, they should be able to have it. Now that VMI is allowing women to destroy the 157-year-plus military school, some people still aren't satisfied.
If you want the VMI experience, it should include the totally shaved head of the ``rats'' (freshmen). And physical-fitness requirements for men should be the same for women.
I am a recent graduate of Mary Baldwin College. If I have the right to go to an all-women's college, then men should have the right to go to an all-male school. All-male schools are becoming a dying breed in the United States. As of next year, Hampden-Sydney in Farmville will be the only all-male college in Virginia.
You would think that the women's colleges would start becoming extinct as well, but they are not. Being private has helped. However, all schools get state funding in some way - whether it's through grants or scholarships. It really is unfair for VMI to have to go from being a school with rich traditions and strong, proud men to a school ruined by women who claim they want the VMI experience but really do not.
For the women who think they want the experience, I say shave their heads and see how many last after the first day. YAMINAH S. CASEY ROCKY MOUNT
God won't bless a nation's sin
I USED to be a Democrat. I am not anymore. It pains me a little to say this because I come from a long line of Democrats. However, events of the past few months have convinced me that the Democratic Party is morally and spiritually bankrupt.
The House of Representatives recently voted to override President Clinton's veto of the late-term abortion ban. What shocks and amazes me is that they had to vote on this issue at all. This procedure, if half of what a Christian radio station is telling me is true, is so barbaric as to rival anything to come out of Nazi medical laboratories. This is a horrid and hideous way to end a life.
I listened to the proceedings from the Democrat and Republican national conventions. I heard delegates and candidates on both sides exhort God to bless America. How can we expect God to bless America when we so openly flout his commandments?
Congressman Rick Boucher voted against the ban originally and voted to uphold the veto. What was he thinking? Did he poll his constituents? Probably not! Was he beholden to President Clinton? Absolutely!
In some countries, unwanted babies - perhaps because they are not the correct gender - have a way of disappearing. Everybody in the Western world condemns the practice of infanticide. So when does the above-mentioned procedure stop being infanticide and become a ``right to choose''? At birth or just before birth? The second or third trimester? Conception? We really don't know, do we?
If we allow this massacre of innocents to continue, don't expect God to bless America. Expect God to do quite the opposite. WILLIAM S. LACY RADFORD
Gays create loving families
IN RESPONSE to Bob Scott's Oct. 1 letter to the editor, ``Morally demented'':
It seems clear to me that the truly ``morally demented'' are those who are so perverse in their thinking that they can only view gay men and lesbians in terms of their sex lives.
Scott dares to define values, morals and ethics for the rest of us when he has apparently chosen hatred and intolerance as his path in life.
The reality is that gay couples can and do live in loving family units. They raise children, pay taxes and bills, hold jobs in all sectors of society, and otherwise struggle, rejoice, mourn, laugh and worry their way through life as we all do. One difference is that they have to laugh and work a good deal harder to overcome the ignorance of those who presume to define ``family values'' for the rest of us. HOLLY MARROW CHRISTIANSBURG
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