DukeEthicist: operation intervention

14 Oct 2011, Posted by Duke Ethicist in Backpages, DukeEthicist, 0 Comments

What is your responsibility to intervene with a friend who has unhealthy habits, and at what point is intervention unhelpful or counter-productive?

If someone is your true friend, you do have the responsibility to look out for him, and he for you. However, you are both entitled to make your own decisions. The decision to intervene should be based on the severity of the unhealthy habit. For example, if a close friend has recently taken up smoking despite knowing fully the negative health consequences, a single talk would be appropriate. You could ask him why he started, if he plans to continue and how it makes him feel when he smokes. If after a single talk he insists on continuing, it’s probably best to respect his decision. As an adult, he is responsible for his own body and will have to face the consequences for his choices.

On the other hand, if he were underage and started smoking, a more serious intervention would be appropriate. If he refused to stop, it may even be best to inform his parents of the situation. Your friend would probably not thank you for it, but smoking is illegal if you’re under 18 for a founded reason—he could do himself serious, permanent harm.

Also beware of unhealthy habits that become progressively worse. If your friend’s bad habit of skipping class on Friday occasionally because he was drinking Thursday night turns into him drinking on Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays—thereby skipping even more classes—a more serious intervention may be in order. If necessary, enlist CAPS, mutual friends or supportive adults for help. In the end, looking out for your friends just proves how much you care about them.

The Duke Ethicist is a project of the Honor Council which responds to ethical questions posed by the Duke community. Our purpose is to provide a medium through which students may anonymously seek advice or spark dialogue. Got a question? Send it to dukeethicist@gmail.com, and look out for a response on our blog.

It’s over

14 Oct 2011, Posted by Walker Schiff in Backpages, Politics Roundup, 0 Comments

Sophia Palenberg/The Chronicle

I have examined the race for the Republican Nomination for President over the past couple days I have come to the conclusion that the race is over. Sure, the primaries don’t actually start until January but it’s over already and I am officially declaring Mitt Romney the winner. You might be wondering, what about Mitt Romney is going to lead him to victory? What makes Mitt Romney so great? Well, absolutely nothing! You might have thought an article about how Mitt Romney is destined to win the primary race would be about how great Mitt Romney is. But it’s not because he is not that great. Rather I’m going to write about why all the other candidates are not going to win.

Let’s start with Gary Johnson, the former governor of New Mexico. He also climbed Mt. Everest and has competed iron man competitions. Sounds awesome, right? WRONG! However, he likes gay people and supports their right to marry. I’m not saying most Republicans are homophobes, but rather, that most homophobes are Republicans.

Let’s move on to everyone’s favorite candidate-who-never-had-a-chance, Rick Santorum. If you still think Santorum has a chance to win this race, then you haven’t googled his name.

Newt Gingrich is another candidate who is in this race for no apparent reason other than to hear himself talk in debates. Even if all the other candidates were covered in santorum, Gingrich would still lose by double-digits.

Ron Paul is the crazy, old libertarian of the field. Every time he makes a lot of sense in debates but, nobody will ever know because everyone phases him out like they phase out Grandpa when he starts talking about the “good, old days.”

And then, there is Jon Huntsman. The former Ambassador to China under Obama has all the GOP voters asking: Who is this Democrat in our debates?

Now let’s get to some of the real candidates—we’ll start with Michele Bachmann. If her cover photo on Newsweek didn’t convince you she is crazy, I don’t know what will. If this race was decided on who hated abortion and loved kids the most, then she would win. But it’s not. It’s about who hates Obama the most.

Herman Cain has been getting a lot of buzz lately. There are two reasons he won’t win this race: 1) his past work experience is suspect; and 2) he’s black.

“Energized by overcoming the many obstacles of his job at Burger King, Herman took on the biggest challenge of his career,” according to Herman Cain’s website.

THAT IS ACTUALLY ON HIS WEBSITE. Seriously, go look right now! I might have taken it out of context but still, that sentence is actually on his website. Also, he is black. I’m not saying most Republicans are racist, but rather that most racists are Republicans.

Finally there is Ricky Perry, also known as George W. Bush 2.0. Have you watched him in debates? He doesn’t make any sense. At least when Dubya displayed his inability to talk by making up a word or forgetting a figure of speech halfway through saying it, you would somewhat understand what he was trying to say. That is simply not the case with Perry. Also, unless the debates get shortened, his performance is unlikely to get better. I know debates are boring, but Perry could at least pretend to be excited that he in running for President.

And there you have it. Mitt Romney will be challenging Barack Obama in 2012.

DukeEthicist: The STINF Stint

07 Oct 2011, Posted by Duke Ethicist in Backpages, DukeEthicist, 0 Comments

When is it reasonably appropriate to use the STINF?

It’s the end of midterm week (part one). Presumably, it’s the end of STINF season. The STINF itself, of course, is not intrinsically bad. Rather, the abuse of it is. So where is the moral gray?

Well, it would be easy to say that there is a binary between using the STINF appropriately, and not. Use it when you are sick, and do not use it otherwise. But are there exceptions to this binary? That is, can we redefine “appropriately?” I think we can—I think we need to. The issue, however, is with whether we apply the STINF to those exceptions. Consider the following example: you are a work-study student who must complete a certain number of hours of work per week (outside of school work). You hold three jobs, and you are the president of an active student organization. Your random selection of classes placed you under inconvenient circumstances such that you have four midterms in two days. You are therefore tasked with balancing your work hours and extracurriculars with the necessary hours for studying. To STINF or not to STINF? You are not sick: do not STINF. But is your preparation for your midterms severely limited? Yes. Does this qualify as an exceptional case? In my book, yes it does. What to do about it cannot be answered by the STINF form, however. I think it can be answered by simple communication.

Professors at this school are among the most accommodating I have ever met. Never have I once been denied the opportunity to extend a deadline on an assignment when I have requested it (for a legitimate reason). Your responsibility rests in providing advance notice—in understanding your schedule beforehand and planning accordingly. To rely on the STINF would be the last-minute option for someone who was too irresponsible to care about the deadlines or requirements of the class. Be smart, plan ahead. Pick up a free student planner from the bookstore. And talk to your teachers—it makes you look bad to let the STINF do the talking.

Digging into Durham: Shooters

07 Oct 2011, Posted by Marianna Jordan in Digging into Durham, News, 1 Comments

To some Duke students, losing one’s Shooters virginity can be considered an initiation ceremony in its own right.

Chronicle File Photo

Although many believe Shooters is a necessary conclusion to a weekend night, all of us are at least somewhat well-versed in what this Durham hotspot represents. Sweaty, drunk, DFMO (dance floor makeout) and grimy are just a few words generally thrown around when Shooters comes to mind.

“Shooters is the game to the pregame,” said sophomore Becky Davis. “It is often the ultimate place to end in a given weekend night, and it speaks to every grade level, depending on what you do.”

Owner and manager Kim Cates believes that one element of Shooters’ success can be attributed to the working relationships that the establishment—and she herself—have maintained with individuals and groups within the larger Duke community.

“This past homecoming, we had alumni come and express how excited they were to be back at Shooters,” Cates said. “People said how much they missed us, and this was a positive thing. It’s really important that I feel this sense of relationship with these people that I am dealing with, and I don’t want that to ever change.”

Cates also noted that she tries hard to work with Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) and Duke Alcohol Law Enforcement (ALE).

“We provide bus services so that students can get to and from Shooters without driving,” Cates said. “Making sure that [students] stay safe is a very important thing for us.”

Cates added that strong relationships with Duke athletics, sororities and fraternities is crucial to Shooters’ success.

“I support the lacrosse, soccer, basketball, volleyball and football teams, among others,” Cates said, “If I want them to come to my business to support me, I feel like I should support them.”

She further explained that Shooters was originally a country nightclub that catered to the locals within the Durham community.

“Duke organizations would occasionally call to book parties,” Cates said. “Then, little by little, on Friday and Saturday nights Shooters saw more and more Duke students to the point where the locals didn’t like it. They were pushed out.”

There was less demand for the bands that used to play and more desire for the DJ as more and more Duke students began coming to Shooters. Cates ultimately replaced the bands with a DJ.

Duke students know the cover charge to be $5, although it is lower for locals.

“The locals don’t support me catering to Duke, but the locals don’t support me like Duke students do,” said Cates.

There is also a tangibly different atmosphere at Shooters on various nights of the week. Wednesday night is deemed “beer pong night,” and Cates explained that a different group usually attends than they might see on Friday or Saturday. More locals from the Durham and surrounding communities come on Fridays.

“I can always depend on our diehard group of Duke students to be there, though,” Cates said.

Thursday and Sunday nights are for private parties, and, as we all know, Saturday is the “biggest” night at Shooters.

Sophomore Sinaida Cherubin believes that there is a time and place for the quintessential Shooters experience.

“I used to hate being dragged there, and you have to be in a certain mindset to go,” Cherubin said. ”It’s not the place where you’re guaranteed to have fun every time—you’ll have fun depending on the people you’re with.”

Sophomore Kamika Shaw explained that there is always one person who loves Shooters in a group of friends. “They can drag a group there and convince you all that you’ll have a good time,” said Shaw. “But there’s honestly no alternative if all you want to do is go out and dance.”

Regardless of the stigma and how one truly feels about this Durham establishment, most would describe Shooters as a necessary check-off the Duke bucket list.

United States of disenfranchisement

04 Oct 2011, Posted by Minshu Deng in Backpages, 1 Comments

Poll taxes, grandfather clauses, literacy tests, white primaries—these were the transparently racist practices used in the past to prevent African Americans from voting. And then there is the racism of today, which is often indirect and not as clearly discriminatory. Case in point: currently Republicans are attempting to rewrite state election laws, requiring voters to have valid government-issued photo IDs.

Special to The Chronicle

The statistics, provided by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University law school, speak for themselves—25 percent of African American voters do not have a valid government-issued photo ID, compared with 8 percent of whites. 15 percent of voters earning less than $35,000 per year—often being members of minority groups—do not have such an ID.

The alleged reasoning behind the new laws is to prevent voter fraud, the pervasiveness of which is open to debate, according to the independent federal and bipartisan Election Assistance Commission.

The problem isn’t necessarily that government-issued photo IDs themselves are unaffordable; the cost of an ID card in North Carolina is a mere 10 dollars. Many third-party voter registration groups, however, will face new restrictions. Rather than being allowed to register on the day of voting, individuals may cast a “provisional ballot” but must fill out all of their paperwork requiring voters’ IDs and then turn those forms in within 48 hours. If paperwork is not in good order, groups face fines and their ballot will not count.

Needless to say, the Democratic Party would suffer from the new laws, having historically carried the vote of many poor and minority voters. Republicans have good reason to change voting laws in ways that strengthen their party’s hold on power in addition to having well said intentions to curb voter fraud. When we step back to look at what exactly the demographic breakdown is though, of who exactly is being put at a disadvantage by the new laws, something doesn’t seem quite right.

The de facto creation of more obstacles for African Americans and other minority groups is no less discriminatory than the systematic measures to prevent African Americans from voting in the past.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson is urging civil rights lawyers at the Justice Department to reverse some of the new laws.

“The irony is those that are willing to declare war for democracy abroad are too willing to declare war against democracy at home,” Jackson wrote in a column of the Chicago Sun-Times.

Kerry Haynie, associate professor of political science, also noted the irony.

“The amount of voter fraud of the type proponents of these laws claim the laws will address is insignificant by any reasonable estimation or calculation,” Haynie said. “It is even more perplexing that Republicans, at the same time they are advocating for smaller government and less government spending,[they] are advocating for a big government type policy. There appears to be a bit of hypocrisy here, and I think the hypocrisy is rooted in racial concerns.”

The new laws are significantly more subtle in how they discriminate against African Americans and minorities, but thereby perhaps more malicious in a certain sense. To ignore the fact that these laws put a certain group at a disadvantage is to simply avoid the topic of racism.

Racism still exists, and it’s nothing to be forgotten.