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Published Letters: 67
Editor's Choice: 5
Chicago Tribune/AP: The American Medical Association to young women: Spring break can be hazardous to your health. (Why single out women? They absorb alcohol faster. But are men immune to sexually transmitted infections, or beer? We don't think so!)
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Hold on: The medical establishment finally steps up and starts
publicizing risks specific to women, and we're rapping them for it? Had
they come out with a milquetoast oratory about the general dangers
to young people on spring break, this retort would likely have been
about why issues which largely affect women are perennially ignored
by the medical establishment and the press. Now that the medical
community has finally realized that women have different physical
responses to drugs than men (leading to long overdue drug studies
for women) why shouldn't we applaud them for continuing to highlight
issues of importance to women? Which one is it, then? Should
the AMA ignore women's issues because highlighting women is sexist?
Or should they highlight women's issues, because lumping women and
men together is sexist?
Just a quick correction: That scientists have deduced that 56% of anorexia is genetic does not imply that 44% of anorexia sufferers are anorexic exclusively due to environmental conditions. It's scientific short-hand, implying that on balance, in the /average/ anorexic, 56% of his or her condition can be attributed to his/her genes, and 44% of that condition due to environment. This recognizes that neither genes nor environment hold the cards in the development of the disorder; rather, that anorexia comes about as a complex interaction between the two. The percentage is merely a measure of the weight or importance of these two factors.
For a great example of this, check out Jill Derby, running as a Democrat in Nevada's 2nd Congressional District. She's a remarkable person, and could go a long way toward swinging the US back toward sanity -- especially as she's running in a heavily Republican district. jillderby.com
"The Family and Medical Leave Act guarantees workers in many companies 12 weeks of paternity leave. Why aren't male college athletes entitled to the same?"
Are you kidding me? There's something profoundly troubling about equating paid employment with voluntary, unpaid leisure activities -- at least insofar as our legislation is concerned. Think about the consequences for all of ten seconds, and you'll have a number of reasons why one ought not open up this particular can of worms.
What do you mean, when you say that Clinton is not running for "first woman president"?
If you've taken a look at her announcement video, you'll note that she does indeed
refer to the hopes and dreams of becoming the first woman president. Indeed, this was
even quoted in Salon, yesterday.
While I agree that pulling the exhibition was not a desireable outcome, Ms. Walsh's assertion that the gallery owners ought to "toughen up" in the face of death threats was truly astounding. Given Salon's neutral-to-favorable coverage of another recent victim of death threats choosing to pull her technology blog, it's -- at least -- inconsistent, but more to the point, both absurd and heartless. I'd wonder how long Ms. Walsh would feel comfortable continuing to post her opinion if she were to receive numerous death threats -- particularly over something about which she may be ambivalent. While we as a society should certaily protect an artist's right to expression, I would expect that the gallery owner's instinct for self-protection would rightly override whatever artistic merit might come about through the viewing of a nude, crucified man.
"But professor Niwa is right: When race enters the equation -- when the perpetrator of a crime of this type is black, like "Beltway Snipers" John Allen Muhammad and his ward Lee Boyd Malvo, or Asian, like Cho -- it rises to the surface and stays there, prompting inevitable discussions about whether "black rage" or "immigrant alienation" were somehow to blame; whether in some fundamental fashion, color of skin, shape of eye, or nation of origin lie at the seething, secret heart of such tragedies."
Is this really all that suprising? I recall on my own campus how different ethnicities gladly set up racially-based groups to promote the idea of a unique-yet-shared experience common only to that ethnic group, as opposed to the mainstream (read: white) experience. I don't see such groups as a problem, nor their analysis as flawed. But when ethnic groups themselves spend so much time perpetuating the idea of difference, should it really be surprising when the mainstream media acknowledges this, and asks whether these differences were involved in the behavior of a member of the group?
While it's crucial to have unlikely contenders in the Democratic primaries to keep the likely shots at least honest to their core values, I had to roll my eyes when I saw that Gravel had either tried to get away with, or be insufferably cute by, quoting a famous Reagan campaign speech: "I won't hold [their] youth and experience against [them]." I'm actually surprised that Mr. Scherer didn't pick up on this.
Mostly, though, we'll miss Scott Lamb. Good luck to you, Scott.
Wait, where do you get the impression that the women undergoing this type of surgery aren't "practicing Muslims"? Does a woman have to remain in a harem, or forego an elite Western education to remain Muslim? Or is it simply unthinkable that a woman from a Muslim family/country who chooses/is allowed to study abroad could still remain true to her faith?